Poker News Roundup: Matt Waxman, Mark Shunock, WSOP Twitches

Matt Waxman has claimed the World Poker Tour Tournament of Champions. The event, held at the Aria in Las Vegas, had a field of just 80 players. Waxman, who is from the United States, outlasted them all to take home $463,375.

Second place was claimed by Matas Cimbolas of Lithuania, who earned $265,590. Darren Elias of the United States actually held the chip lead going into the final table, but he settled for third place and $177,060. France’s David Benyamine finished in fourth place with $123,045, and American Nick Schulman rounded out the top five with $89,290.

It was Waxman’s first win in a tournament since 2013 and he has now won over $4 million in live cash events. However, this still wasn’t his biggest payday. That came back in September 2011 when he won $721,178 for first place at a WPT Grand Prix in Paris.

WPT Hires Golden Knights Announcer

As the Vegas Golden Knights play in the Stanley Cup final, it has been reported that their inner-rink announcer, Mark Shunock, will be joining the World Poker Tour. Shunock has been the excitable MC inside T-Mobile Arena at Golden Knights games this season. Now he’ll be shifting to the World Poker Tour where he’ll hopefully fire up the crowd in similar fashion.

We don’t have any details about when he’ll get started but the idea is simple: the WPT would like to spice up the poker fan experience. One way it is differentiating itself from the other big poker brands is by looking to “sportify” poker. That means announcers, getting the crowd fired up, possibly doing fan interviews, and contests. With the WPT starting to partner with different esports events – such as using the Esports Arena at the Luxor in Las Vegas – it seems like Shunock will have plenty of work as an announcer.

WSOP Partners With Twitch

The World Series of Poker continues its aim to reach a greater audience and now will be partnering with Twitch TV to do so. Twitch has gotten in on the action as it’s going to stream live coverage of 31 tournaments and 25 final tables from June 2 to July 14. You will be able to see these events on twitch.tv/pokercentral. David Tuchman is going to be in charge of the commentary on Twitch and he’ll be joined by Jeff Platt, a former poker player who is also the host of the PokerNews podcast.

Twitch has become a popular option with young cord-cutters or people who never had cable to begin with turning to it in great numbers. Twitch is typically used for watching video game live streamers but it is expanding into an area it feels viewers will be interested in.